I have always wondered how MPAA, RIAA and other foreign film industry watchdogs have tried to curb piracy. They haven't succeeded in the battle against piracy, but atleast they have tried to scare people. If not scare atleast they have sent some letters to the Bittorrent/P2P that have all the copyrighted movies/audios free for the entire world. The latest on the hit-list of the watchdogs is Demonoid.com, which is a popular Bittorrent tracker. Today, the hosting servers of Demonoid were taken down and a warning displayed to the users...
That made me ask the question, what is the Indian Film Industry doing to stop online piracy?? Haven't heard anyone talk about online piracy... May be some producers or actors have asked people not watch pirated movies or download stuff off the internet, but no legal action has been taken against these online piracy communities. There are many "desi" community sites that offer torrents and trackers for Bittorrent downloads and I don't think anyone from the Indian film industry even knows about it... I wonder if they've even heard of Bittorrent??
With so many movies being made, may be piracy helps some movies get an audience. But it doesn't help them make any money. I think some big studios that use modern technologies know about it, but I guess they are scared to send the legal notice to their audiences. After all, they'll get a bad name if they do it, right?? May be the studios feel that it's a publicity thing, which can be recovered from the high ticket prices at multiplexes these days...
Whatever it may be, I think piracy is a crime and some noise from the studios will help reduce piracy. Atleast, the weak hearted will get scared. As for the real pirates, they'll always find the "patli galli"...
4 comments:
Hi,
as a ex lawyer of MPAA in India I have worked on online piracy and piracy on the roads in India. MPAA spends several thousands of $ to curb piracy.
I would like to share with you our meeting with the Telgu, Tamil and Hindi film producers/association and the most interested people are the Telegu Film Assocation who have set up their team to curb PIRACY in general which also inculdes online piracy.
Whereas the other fil assocaitions in India are least bothered as they are happy with the quick bucks they make and shift the ball to the theatre owners who needs to be worried of their collections.
The issue here is there is no association as such and even if it is then who is to shell out from their wallet and how much?
Unless and untill this attitude changes its going to be tough to curb PIRACY. Also the attitude of the people in general matters.
WILL I TEACH MY SON TO ROB FROM A SUPER MARKET? BUT I DONT MIND HIM WATCHING A PIRATED MOVIE
Raja Selvam
selvamraja@gmail.com
If the attitude of the film associations aren't changing, then may be the loss due to piracy isn't much... but yes, there is definitely a non-robbery attitude among consumers towards piracy...
Its great to get an insight from a laywer like you!! Thanks for the comment!!
@Goodspeed,
Piracy is not stealing. Ask your son to go to the supermarket, make a copy of a toy on display and walk away. He never disturbs the toy on display.
Piracy is Copyright infringement and NOT stealing. You, as a lawyer, should know the difference. Shame on you for perpetuating that stereotype. What, were you sick the day they taught law in law school?
@ Anonymous
You are such a coward :-)
Dont make an ass of yrself
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